CZI calls for Buy Zimbabwe Act

Bianca Mlilo, Business Reporter THE Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI) has called for the establishment of a Buy Zimbabwe Act, which will impose a specific local procurement quota to support the viability of local companies.

CZI president and United Refineries Limited chief executive officer, Busisa Moyo, said the economy was losing critical liquidity through continued importation of cheap finished products.

He said Zimbabwe’s obsession with imports was crippling the country hence the need to come up with a legal instrument that enforces buying local products.

Moyo suggested the proposed Act should make it mandatory for government departments, local authorities and businesses’ buyers to at least source 40 to 60 percent of products from local firms.

“The culprits here are the government, ordinary consumers and business itself. So, we’re all involved in this and that’s the challenge here,” said Moyo while addressing a business briefing in Bulawayo.

“We’re holding discussions at the CZI national council apex body to talk about some sort of a Buy Zimbabwe Act as opposed to indigenisation taking the only forefront.”

Moyo said it was disturbing that most businesses and government departments continue to export jobs through imports while thousands of Zimbabweans remain unemployed with factories operating below capacity.

“Probably the time has come for us to be bold about localising demand because the country technically can’t afford to continue on a $3.3 billion trade deficit annually without creating serious economic problems,” he said.

“The strange thing is that for the last six years this deficit has subsisted, which is very weird and doesn’t make economic sense because if your economy is $14 billion and you continue to have a deficit of $3.3 billion, it should take you five years to run out of money.”

Foreign-owned shops mainly in the retail sector have been accused of sabotaging the economy by flooding their shelves with imported products only while they shun local goods.

In 2012, Zimbabwe came up with a “Buy Zimbabwe Campaign” to champion the cause of local consumption with the hope of elevating quality local products and services in an environment where foreign products, most of them substandard, were suffocating the local industry.

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Busisa now you advocating for laws that will result in lose-lose situation for both the consumer and business. the reason why people are not buying zim products is simply that they are expensive compared to products produced in other countries especially SA. Some products are also of inferior quality. you cannot expect people to support an industry that is lagging behind in terms of technology, full of inefficiencies and high production costs. the industries must look at their processes, technology, costs etc and see where they are getting it wrong. in this day and age when everybody is talking about reducing barriers to trade you advocating for laws to constrain trade. if zim is inefficient in producing goods then lets import them cheaply and divert resources to producing goods in which we have competitive advantage. Please Busisa, we have been under oppression for the last 36 years and you calling on further laws to ensure that this govt continues oppressing us by forcing us to purchase locally produced goods that inferior and expensive. that’s certainly not what I expected from the man of cloth.